We couldn’t afford what they spent then, and we’re not going to be able to afford what they want to spend now.  But despite all the song and dance about stimuluses and leaving the middle-class alone while we fix more things that aren’t broken, at some point something has to give and administration officials today have begun spilling the beans that tax increases are coming.

“We will not get this economy back on track, recovery will be not strong and sustained, unless we … can convince the American people that we’re going to have the will to bring these deficits down once recovery is firmly established,” Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said on ABC’s “This Week.” 

Asked point blank whether it was right to suggest it is a matter of when, not if, taxes will be raised, Geithner responded, “It is absolutely right.”

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan warned that even a deficit-neutral plan being touted by Democrats to fund government-run health insurance program won’t be enough in the long run. 

“We have to attack both the original shortfall and make sure we fund whatever new initiatives that occur in the health care area. It’s not adequate to be strictly revenue-neutral, because there’s a lot more to be done,” he said, noting the large number of baby boomers who currently are signing onto Medicare.

Personally, I’ve not asked the federal government to spend anything close to what it has been spending for years on various programs and entitlements and special interests.  I never asked them to let Wall Street trade in toxic assets or to force banks to loan money to people who can’t afford to pay it back.  I didn’t ask them to buy not one, but two car companies for me.  I didn’t ask them to try to take over American medicine and I certainly never asked them to try to turn C02 into a trading commodity that will raise the price of everything so they and a few of their friends can become the “evil rich” they speak of so derisively today.

Did you?